Whether Pigs Have Wings
by MissTempleton
Summary: Sequel to The Sea is Boiling Hot - Jack and Phryne return home to Melbourne. Settling in to new versions of old routines can be tricky when a murder appears impossible to solve.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

As the _Strathaird_ drew in to Melbourne, there was the usual crowd of friends and family waiting to greet her. Detective Inspector Jack Robinson and The Hon Phryne Fisher stood at the rail and looked for any of the 221B family on the dockside; she in front, he flanking her, his hands beside hers on the railing. No-one, to glance at them, would be in any doubt as to the nature of their relationship.

"See anyone, Jack?" she asked.

"Well, yes – a few hundred folk, but I can't immediately see … wait, isn't that Mr Butler? Over there, on the right? At the very edge of the crowd?"

She looked where he directed, and saw what he saw – and more.

"Bert and Cec – and they've brought the taxi as well as the Hispano. We might get all the trunks home in one trip. Hallelujah!" She looked harder. "No Mac, though – must be working – and no Dot, that I can see. Your Senior Constable's conspicuous by his absence too, Inspector. I hope you're not too upset." She went silent, and he glanced at her – he, too, was surprised that Mrs Collins had not come to greet her mistress home.

"I'll live," Jack replied easily. He glanced at her sideways. "Strange about Mrs Collins. Maybe she's getting the house ready?"

"Mmm" Phryne replied, patently unconvinced, and with a hint of worry crossing her features. "Let's just say I'm looking forward to getting home even more now." She met his glance. "Are you coming with us?"

"Yes, if I may?" he replied instantly. "I know we're trying to keep what we have …." that little half-smile played on his lips for a moment, "quiet, but this is … your family. They're bound to find out eventually; and …" he scanned her upturned face, "I'd like them to know. I think it will be good to be able to avoid pretence with the people we trust the most."

He was rewarded with the sort of smile that made him regret the fact that they were in such a public place. Backing away from the rail, he reached for her hand and said, "We should go and double check we haven't left anything in the cabin, shouldn't we?"

She started to disagree, then caught his eye, and agreed it was very important that they double check they hadn't left anything in the cabin.

They both went to double check that there wasn't anything left in the cabin. With the door firmly closed, and Jack leaning his weight against it. The fact that his eyes were closed might not have been particularly helpful to the hunt for their belongings, but Phryne found no cause to object. In fact, she found his example so sensible that she followed it. And had to completely reapply her lipstick afterwards, while he found himself having inexplicably to remove some. They both agreed Luscious Rose wasn't precisely his shade.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Their welcome, as they reached the dockside, was warm. All three of her faithful friends found themselves gleefully kissed (which made even Bert go pink, while the gratification on Mr Butler's face was plain to behold. Cec was quite simply tongue-tied). The trunks were loaded on to the taxi, and Mr Butler ceremoniously drove Jack and Phryne back to St Kilda in the Hispano-Suiza.

"Mr B?" Phryne asked hesitantly. "Is Dot all right? I mean ... I thought she might have been with you?"

Mr Butler smiled down at her.

"Mrs Collins is waiting for us at your house, Miss Fisher – she is enormously excited to see you," he added with – wait, was that a _smirk_ from Mr B? She must be mistaken.

However, when they pulled up outside Phryne's house, it became immediately obvious that it had indeed been a smirk. And why.

"Oh, my dearest, precious DOROTHY?!" exclaimed Phryne, who had leaped out of the car before it stopped moving. She raced up the front path, and caught in a warm but rather frightened embrace what could only be described as a beatifically smiling, robustly healthy, warm, comfortable … whale.

"Miss, it's so lovely to have you home in time …. Yes ... it's twins ..." she said with nervous, happy tears. "Seven and a bit months, and they're doing their best to get out!"

"Well, tell them to stay in a bit longer, darling Dot, we need Hugh and or Dorothy junior – or both – to be properly prepared before they take on the world!" Phryne smiled mistily. Jack did a double take.

 _Mistily_? Okay, it was Dottie, and it was twins, but …. Phryne?

She happened to glance up, and caught his expression.

And narrowed her eyes. Judgement was suspended, pending appeal.

"Mr Butler, if you've been doing your duty while I've been away, there is champagne ready to be drunk," she declared. "I demand that it be opened instantly, but if Mrs Collins has more than a thimbleful you will have me to answer to!"

Mr B did the rounds with glasses, and toasts were drunk; to the as-yet-unborn Collinses (Hugh's pride could have been wrapped three times around the house, let alone his heavily pregnant wife, thought Jack, not in the least bit mistily); to the safe return of Miss Fisher and Inspector Robinson; to cases successfully solved on their travels.

Eventually, and regretfully, Jack put down his glass.

"I should get down to City South and see if it's still there," he announced. "Miss Fisher, please excuse me?"

"Of course, Jack," she smiled. "I'll see you out." She followed him into the hallway, helping him into his coat and setting his hat on his head at a jaunty angle, before leaning in for a brief, in-full-view-of-everyone, kiss.

As he turned to go, Jack glanced over her shoulder into the parlour. His lips twitched. Leaning close to Phryne's ear, he whispered.

"If you think you hear a ringing sound, it's the effect of five pennies dropping all at once."

Her eyes danced back at his as she politely held the door open for him to leave.

Closing the door behind him, she turned round to face her "family", whose expressions ranged from stunned - Bert - to gleeful - Dot - to all points in between.

"More champagne, Mr B?" she said nonchalantly.

"Coming right up, Miss!" he answered with alacrity.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Jack closed his office door and surveyed the pile of files ruefully. Three months away – almost four – had left its mark on his in-tray. Settling in to his chair, with no more than a fond glance at one well-polished corner of the desk that was currently lacking its most attractive ornament, he pulled the top file towards him and began to read.

By the time Collins came on shift two hours later, the pile of files was half the size, and Jack's head was buzzing with details of unsolved crimes. He glanced up as he saw Collins take his place at the front desk.

"Collins, a word?"

"Sir," Collins dodged round the corner of the front desk and walked into the office.

"I've been going through the caseload. You've been doing well, but there's a lot of ground still to be covered." For the best part of an hour, they went through the files together, Jack suggesting a new angle or course of questioning that might be adopted, Collins' notebook filling steadily.

"This stabbing in the Alexandra Gardens. Have we still no idea who the victim was?"

"No, sir." Collins pursed his lips. "He was a sundowner – a swagman - and didn't socialise at all. Hardly spoke to the other guys in the park. No-one knew his name, that we spoke to. His nickname was Stonewall – because that was what you got when you tried to talk to him. All the statements we have are from people who saw him, knew him, were near him at around the time we think he died – but nothing that actually ties in with the death."

He blew out heavily.

"The morgue are getting on to us. They want to send the body for cremation. I've been ... stalling them."

Jack sympathised. He knew the routine. They had some time. They would get more time if they were building a case. But with no case – no body could stay in the morgue for long.

The briefing done, Collins got up to leave; as he got to the office door, he bethought himself of another line of questioning he'd been told to pursue. Quietly closing the door, he turned back to the Inspector.

"Sir …." He hesitated.

"Yes, Collins?" Jack looked up, and guessed immediately what was on his mind. He decided to take pity on the man. He gave a half-smile.

"Please tell Mrs Collins that Miss Fisher and I have indeed reached a degree of understanding, but that I am not foolish enough to think that it will in any way affect her behaviour in the context of the operations of City South Police Station. I'm sure I don't need to ask you to keep what you saw earlier today to yourself."

"No sir! Of course!" Hugh ventured shyly, "But Mrs Collins and I are both delighted, sir," on which words he left the room.

It was only when Jack noticed that he couldn't read the words on the page without switching on the light that he realised how late it was. Considering he wasn't officially starting back to work until the following day, he decided that enough was enough, and bidding farewell to Collins, put on hat and coat and strolled into the street.

And had a decision to make.

Where was home?

Could he presume to return to 221B, as he desperately wanted to do; or should he allow Phryne some time to herself to reconnect to the home life she'd left almost a year ago? His cases, he recalled, were still at her house, but ….

As if he'd put two fingers in his mouth and whistled, his attention was drawn to the rapid arrival and screeching halt of a shiny Hispano-Suiza in front of him. Sometimes, he thought, there was a pleasing symmetry in their lives.

What a very beautiful car it was, he reflected. Simply stunning. And such a marvellous engine, with those six excellent cylinders. And such pleasing lines.

The driver wasn't so dusty either.

"Hop in, Jack, you're going to be late for dinner at this rate."

A direct order was always worth obeying.

Dinner was a raucous affair. They were joined by Phryne's old friend Elizabeth MacMillan – Mac – who commandeered Mr Butler's martini jug and experimented liberally.

"After all, we have to celebrate you two finally coming to your senses," she remarked.

"Or losing them?" asked Jack conversationally, to which Phryne took immediate exception.

It was late when Mac finally left; Mr Butler finished clearing up and retired for the night, leaving Jack and Phryne in the parlour with a glass of scotch apiece. She slipped off her shoes and tucked her feet up.

"Just like old times, Jack?" she asked, eyes warm.

"With one very important difference," he said, scooting across the couch towards her. He placed his glass carefully on the table, and ran a finger down her cheek. "All the things I have sat here wanting to do, I now can." He considered, raised an eyebrow. "Well, most of them."

At this, Phryne's interest was definitely piqued.

"I'd very much like to know how your imagination runs, Inspector. If I were to arrange, say, for Mr B to have a night off, might there be a chance for you to … explain in more detail?"

He pretended to consider, and raised his eyes to her with a show of apology.

"I think actually we might need a whole weekend ..." At this, Phryne smiled delightedly, downed her drink in a single shot, uncurled on to her feet and held out her hand to him.

"I think we should start as soon as possible – but perhaps for now, upstairs?" Allowing her to draw him to his feet, he graciously agreed.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

The following morning, routine set in in earnest. Waking at first light was easy. Leaving bed, less so, and decidedly hindered by its other occupant who appeared to have no sense of civic responsibility whatsoever and all the clinginess of an octopus with attachment issues.

Leaving the house rather later than planned, though still long before the rest of its occupants were stirring, Jack made his way to City South. The morning's work was unrelenting, and when Collins put his head around the door to announce "Miss Fisher on the phone, sir", he stretched for the receiver with a feeling of relief.

"Hello, Jack." He could hear the smile in her voice and leaned back in his chair with an unashamedly fatuous grin.

"Miss Fisher."

"I've only just woken up." Jack checked the time. Nearly eleven. "I think I must have been absolutely ... exhausted ..." she continued in a low voice.

"One should always be careful with strenuous exercise, Miss Fisher. I find it's best to work up to ... peak performance ... by easy stages. And with frequent practice."

The chuckle that this sally received made him regret the distance between them. And search hurriedly for a change of subject.

"How can I help you – right at this moment – Miss Fisher?" They could discuss ways in which he could help her later ... later.

"Detective Inspector, I am ringing to pass on an invitation from the wife of the Chief Commissioner, to tea, this afternoon at four. Now, before you expostulate," as he took in a breath to do just that, "it's work, Jack. Bill's going to be there too, and he wants to thank you – well, us – for solving the McCullum case."

It still stuck in Jack's craw, though. When he had to thank one of his men for doing a good job, he just walked up to them and said thank you. If warranted, he mentioned them for promotion.

He emphatically did not ask them round to his house for afternoon tea and cucumber sandwiches. With or without crusts.

"Can't you go for both of us?" he asked plaintively.

"Certainly, Jack," she replied smartly. "I'll just dig out that Buffalo Bill badge of yours and reappoint myself as a Special Constable for Melbourne. Or would you rather I slipped a ring on my left hand and let everyone assume that Captain Hollister had his wicked way with us, enabling me to speak for you ... in the biblical sense?" He sighed. As ever, she was right. He had to go.

And made a mental note to remind Phryne precisely how biblical his senses could be.

"At least don't make me take one of our cars. Pick me up here?"

Victory rang loud in her voice as she sweetly agreed.

He was deeply engrossed in the file on the Stonewall killing – how could there be no-one? No next of kin trying to find him? No trusted friend from the hedgerows or the trenches trying to keep tabs? – when Phryne waltzed into his office. No, that was unfair.

It was practically a Charleston. Especially when she posed against his door, one foot kicked up behind her, toe pointed.

"Ready to go, Jack?" she asked jauntily.

He couldn't deny that Miss Fisher in party mood was a sight to gladden the heart. An unwilling smile was tugged from his lips as he stacked the papers together and grabbed coat and hat.

"As I'll ever be" It was just tea and friendly chat with his most senior boss.

What could possibly go wrong?


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

The first inkling of what could, in fact, go wrong was derived when Bert pulled on the handbrake outside the Coopers' house.

Alongside a dozen other cars, and in front of a small group of press photographers.

Phryne took out her compact to check the perfection of her lipstick after their unofficial greeting in the back of the car. Jack wanted to crawl under the car seat.

He caught her eye. She had the grace to look down.

"You knew, then. You knew this was going to be a society shivoo to celebrate us shutting down a white slave ring." His regard was as icy as his words.

Typically for Phryne, she came out fighting.

"Jack, describe to me an attractive crime that makes everyone feel bad about it stopping and I promise you I'll organise the appropriate wake. In the meantime, we did good work, please come and let the Chief Commissioner say so. And you still have some lipstick on your cheek."

He sulkily swiped it off, glancing at her for affirmation, before opening the door to step out, and rather than reach back to offer his hand, held the door politely open.

The photographers were on them in seconds. Well, specifically, Phryne.

"Miss Fisher! Over here!" "Miss Fisher! Great dress!" "Miss Fisher! Did the police help at all in solving the crime or was it just you?" She laughed them off, and to the last, more pointed question, threw a "The Detective Inspector solved the crime, Travis – I was just along for the ride" with a broad grin.

Jack's expression became the stonier as they walked towards the door, helpfully held open by the Coopers' butler, and firmly closed behind them.

Phryne waited while Jack was relieved of his coat.

" _Along for the ride?"_ he whispered witheringly.

She knew it had been a bad spur of the moment decision, and so put her nose in the air.

"Next time, I'll tell them you were only there to carry my shopping, if you'd rather."

Making a show of checking her reflection in the hall mirror, she stalked forward to the Coopers' garden room, graciously accepting a glass of champagne and a kiss from their host. Jack put on his blandest smile and followed in her illustrious wake.

He might as well get used to it.

In the end, the event wasn't too dreadful. The thanks from the CC were expressed, not publicly to a round of saccharine applause (Jack's chief fear) but privately, before introducing him to the Mayor – a man of not much more than Jack's own age, ex RAAF, with firm views on ways to reduce crime. They didn't precisely see eye to eye – Jack wanted to invest in policing, the Mayor in education and sport – but the conversation was satisfactory for both participants, and they parted in mutual respect and goodwill.

Phryne pretended she hadn't witnessed the encounter, but glowed inwardly while offering training in self defence to the Girl Guides, whose leader had robust views (almost as robust as Phryne's) on what constituted appropriate education for young women.

By the time they left, the press had given up. Or so they thought. As they strolled, differences mostly resolved, towards Bert and Cec's waiting cab, Phryne turned to him and smiled up, squeezing their interlinked arms. He was returning her smile with his eyes when a camera bulb popped.

"Lovely, Miss Fisher!" shouted Travis as he raced off, clearly in no doubt as to the popularity – or lack of it - he was likely to have garnered.

The caption in the _Argus_ the following morning wasn't calculated to make Jack's coffee any more palatable.

 _CELL BLOCK COCKTAILS: Detective Inspector Jack Robinson and the Hon Phryne Fisher seen leaving the Chief Commissioner's party in their honour yesterday. It can't be all work and no play at City South – Jack's no dull boy!_

Phryne, again, called him mid-morning. This time, Senior Constable Collins told her rather hesitantly that the Detective Inspector was In A Meeting and could not be disturbed. She didn't believe it for an instant, but wasn't in the habit of shooting the messenger, so she simply huffed, and told Hugh that when the Detective Inspector was ready to take messages, she would be grateful if he could be told that he was invited to join her at Dr Mac's house for dinner that evening.

"Always assuming he's not thrown off society's mantle altogether, Hugh," she said conspiratorially down the line. "If you get the chance, can you try to remind him that by the time he's sitting down at Mac's table, that photo will be wrapped around a wharfie's supper?"

"I can try, Miss, but I can't deny he's taken it to heart," Collins replied worriedly. "It was pretty horrid. Dottie cried."

Phryne refrained from responding acerbically that Dottie should be expected to cry at a dropped ice cream in her current condition, and contented herself with a terse instruction not to let the Inspector Mope, Hugh.

The Inspector Moped for precisely as long as it took to take himself to his own home after work, force the front door open against the barrier of post that was lying behind it, scan through it stoically for anything which wasn't a bill, and conclude that if that was the best society had to offer him he could at least get a decent scotch from Mac.

The post had only itself to blame that he didn't bother returning to look at it again that night.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

It was late the following evening, and Jack was struggling to make head or tail of a legal deposition designed to ensure that the defendant would walk free purely because of a surplus of gerunds. When the phone rang in the outer office, he was willing it to interrupt him.

"Sir, we have a body discovered at the docks. Male, late middle age, evening dress."

"Get the car, Collins"

When they pulled up at the Victoria Dock, the place was deserted. Leaving the car, they ran to the dockside itself – and pulled up short.

The dockside was empty. Of people, alive or deceased.

Perplexed, they looked at each other and switched on torches. Each took one side of the dock, and swinging lights from side to side, scanned the waterfront. Then, were disturbed by another torch approaching from the opposite direction.

The torchlight occasionally highlighted a bright vermillion, flowing coat. Jack's heart sank.

He was distracted immediately by a call from Collins.

"Over here, sir! …. But …. I don't understand …."

He jogged over to join Collins; and gaped.

At a chalk outline. The kind of which would be left by his own investigating team, once they had removed the body. Number of bodies present: zero.

He felt a sense of inevitable foreboding. In the coldest voice he could manage to someone who'd made a completely improper and probably scientifically impossible suggestion in his ear that morning just as he was leaving, he stated firmly,

"Miss Fisher. This is not a joke, and not appropriate. I realise you have occasionally been helpful in removing evidence from a crime scene that has later proved important. Removing the body is a step too far."

The hurried step of heels behind him heralded her catching up.

"Even I wouldn't go that far, Jack. Forgive me for asking what may be a silly question but – as we've yet to find a body, what makes you think that it was here?"

"Perhaps this?" he moved forward to crouch over the chalk outline, and reached out a tentative finger to a darker patch. "And the night watchman who called it in? Come to that, why are you here? I can't believe he called you too … did he?" How often, thought Jack, a highly unlikely event turned out to be exactly what had happened. He looked at her in hope that for once he was wrong.

"I don't think so. It was a tip-off – just someone saying that there was a body at the Victoria Dock that I'd find interesting." She considered the reasonably healthy Detective Inspector and her lips quirked briefly. "To be fair, they weren't wrong."

As Collins played his torch over the area, the bloodstain showed clearly, and Phryne switched her gaze to that, next. She moved in to crouch opposite Jack, and shone her own torch on the stain.

The next thing they knew, there was shouting from the watchman's gate. Running feet, and a bright flash ensued. Both Jack and Phryne were caught in the frame – literally.

"Where's the body, Inspector?" shouted the journalist. "Kicked it off the pier already? Just another nobody? Get back to the party, Robinson!" Collins moved in, shooing the man off the dock, but the damage was done. Jack straightened and put his hands on his hips, rolling his eyes skyward. Was this what life would be from now on?

"If there's a party, I do think someone should have told me," said Phryne flatly. "Ignore it, Jack. There's nothing we can do about it now, and we've still got a body to find." She put a hand in the small of Jack's back, a gesture of calm support. "Let's go and find the watchman who called it in."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

The watchman was lugubrious and mostly unhelpful.

"Don't know what you mean. Body was there an hour ago when I did my rounds."

He gazed morosely into middle distance.

"Mebbe the rats et it." He looked up at them, clearly hoping to have solved the crime for them in the most stomach-churning manner imaginable.

Jack's patience had worn thin enough that day.

"Please, just describe to us what you saw and did, Mr Sowerby."

"Did my rounds, didn't I? Saw the nob lying flat out on the dock, so I went over – thought 'e was drunk, like." He shook his head in sorrow at the dissolute behaviour of Melbourne's high society.

"Cold as ice, he was, inspector. That's when I saw he was dead," he explained helpfully. "So I came straight back to my office and telephoned you."

"You can't see the dockside from here, though?" Jack glanced back the way they had come.

"No, true enough" agreed the night watchman. "He weren't about to get up and run off, though, the way he was when I saw him." He wheezed in a fashion that was worrying until they worked out was in fact a laugh.

Jack was stumped.

"Can you describe the body?" Phryne asked, taking up the strain on what was definitely one of their more challenging interviews.

The night watchman considered for a moment.

"Old boy. White hair, white beard. Scruffy, 'cept for the clothes, but that's the nobs for you, eh, Inspector?" They pressed for more details but as witnesses went, this one was one of the poorest in the rapidly-expanding City of Melbourne.

Giving up, they wandered back out onto the dockside.

"I want to come back in daylight, Jack, and have another look round," decided Phryne. "Maybe we can find out how they got rid of the body. Do you need to drag the dock?"

"Maybe," said Jack glumly.

Then he looked up at her.

"I'll have to go back to the station to report this. I don't want to rouse your household when I get finished, so I'll just head home."

She glanced at him sharply, lips thinning.

"Yes, of course you must." She narrowed her eyes. "You'll be safe there, after all."

 _Coward_ was the subtext.

He didn't care. It wasn't cowardice, but a desire to keep the precious thing that was starting to build between them away from prying and prurient eyes that led him to seek a single night in his own space.

"Good night, Miss Fisher." With that, she thought, it was as though the weeks of warmth, hilarity and affection were killed, stone dead. Could he not see how pointless it was to pretend?

He nodded politely, and sought the police car. She nodded politely back and sought the Hispano, her home, and her bed. The empty one. With no Jack in it. Not even when she reached across instinctively after waking from a bad dream.

Wide awake, she lay on her back and stared into the darkness, counting the hours until dawn.

Across town, he was doing the same, and trying to convince himself that it was for the best.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

They returned to the dock the next morning, meeting politely at an early (for her) hour and splitting up to look around the surrounding area. If either noticed the weariness in the other's eyes, they didn't remark on it.

Nor did either of them remark on the photograph which had made that morning's paper. He'd already had his Superintendent's view on that, and was still smarting.

 _CLUELESS?_ _Detective Inspector Jack Robinson and the Hon Phryne Fisher interrupt their busy social life to investigate a crime. No prizes for guessing whose body has the Inspector's eye!_

"What gets me, Jack, is that there aren't any more bloodstains – just that one in the outline," she remarked.

He scanned the area, and realised she was right. If the body had been bleeding, there should have been at least some trace of it being moved. There was none – the place was clean. How could anyone get it away without leaving a trail?

Eventually, they collectively agreed they'd drawn a blank, and parted – she to go home. He was about to return to the station, then changed his mind. Via a roundabout route, checking his mirror constantly, parking two blocks away and entering by the route more usually employed by his Senior Constable, he turned up at Phryne's kitchen door.

Mr Butler was not one whit perturbed. Jack found himself wondering what it would take to discompose Phryne's factotum, and decided it would probably involve an invasion from another planet, as he seemed to have the population of his own completely pegged.

"I can only apologise for the unorthodox method of my approach, Mr Butler, but I can assure you the interests I'm serving are as much Miss Fisher's as my own. If she has a moment, I'd be grateful?"

"Of course, Inspector," responded Mr Butler cheerfully. And, with a swift, assessing glance, "Please come through to the parlour; and if I might suggest, perhaps a pot of coffee, and some of the pastries I've just finished preparing? I'm sure you've already breakfasted," he said mendaciously, "but I think Miss Fisher will be grateful for the chance to recoup her strength."

He commented noncommittally, "It must have been very difficult for her to get through such an early appointment after a sleepless night."

Jack glanced at him sharply, but he was to be given no more clues, it seemed. Heartened, though, he followed Mr B through, shedding his coat and hat on their usual pegs on the way.

The coffee and pastries arrived first, and Jack fell on them, wondering at what stage in his adult life he'd stopped being able to fend for himself. Probably, he thought, at about the time Phryne's Mr B entered it.

Phryne arrived as he was dusting off crumbs. She paused in the doorway. He gave a half-smile and held out both arms, as much in supplication as in welcome.

She walked unhesitatingly into them and buried her face in his neck.

"Please, Jack, if we have to do that again, let it be for a better reason than a lousy scandalsheet hack," she whispered, weary tears choking her voice.

Even the Lousy Scandalsheet Hack would have been appalled by the quality of dialogue that ensued for the next few minutes, but by the time Phryne raised her head from his shoulder and shifted from his lap to sit next to him on the couch, they were both feeling immeasurably better.

When they parted, Jack finally did head back to the station. Phryne was going to visit Dot, who was, according to her doting husband, starting to become irritable with being stuck in the house, but sternly forbidden by Dr Mac from leaving it unless it was to go to hospital for the twins' delivery. Phryne asked Mr Butler for a basket of interesting snacks to nibble on, and he added a pie for the Collins' evening meal, "Because poor Mrs Collins has to sit down every few minutes, and that's no way to get a pie on the table," he remarked sympathetically.

"Genius, Mr B," said Phryne. "I'm going to ask her about this strange case that we started yesterday, to see if she has any ideas. Dot so often sees things from her perspective that I completely miss."

Mrs Collins was understandably pleased to see her employer when Phryne pulled up outside their neat terrace.

"Miss Fisher! I'm so glad you're here. I've even got tired of sewing – it's hard to stay in one position for long, and trying to work around _this"_ she indicated her vast bump, "makes it almost impossible to sew a straight seam."

Phryne grinned, and lugged the basket to the Collins' tiny kitchen. Dot exclaimed over the contents, and even became a little weepy when she unpacked the pie.

"Oh, don't worry, Miss," she sniffed, "I'm crying at the least thing these days. But Mr B is so thoughtful! Hugh says he doesn't mind that we're having endless cold collations for meals, but it's all I can do to stay on my feet long enough to slice a tomato." She put a hand in the small of her back, in the manner of expectant mothers the world over, and grimaced. Then her brow furrowed and she let out an involuntary gasp.

Then there was the oddest sound of running water.

Phryne glanced at the sink, where the taps were innocently closed.

And at the floor, which was awash.

"Oh, Miss Fisher," said Dorothy faintly.

"I think my waters just broke."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

Considering that the challenge was rather less than that of delivering wounded soldiers to a field hospital in war-torn France, Phryne's moment of panic was ruthlessly quashed.

"OK, Dot, you go and change into something dry and comfortable. I'm going to make two phone calls – one to Dr Mac and one to City South. Then you and I are going to proceed in an orderly fashion to the hospital. Just this once, I'm going to take it so steady you won't have to close your eyes. You can't be that close yet, and I'd not like to answer to Constable Collins if I don't get you there in one piece."

Dorothy shut her eyes anyway, and nodded. "Just hurry, Miss, please? I'd rather be where Dr Mac is, if it's all the same to you."

Phryne stepped swiftly to the phone and secured Mac's presence as soon as she was due to become free. Then she thought for a moment, and on being put through to the police station, asked not for Hugh Collins but for Jack.

"Jack, love, it's me. Now, I need you to listen calmly to what I have to say and not react loudly. I'm guessing Hugh's in earshot?"

Jack confirmed that the door of his office was open.

"Right, here's the situation. Dot's waters have broken – Jack, I _told_ you, be quiet. I've called Mac and she's going to meet us at the hospital, where I am about to drive Dot at such a slow pace that you won't believe it without at least one secondary witness. Your job is to get Hugh there in one piece, and in as calm a state as you can manage. Got it?"

He got it. Putting the phone down, he stuck his head round the door and cheerily asked Senior Constable Collins if he could bring the car round, as they had to make a trip across town. Hugh innocently complied. He was slightly surprised when the Inspector elected to drive, but as Jack chose not to disclose the purpose of their journey until it was almost completed, his opportunity to panic was limited; and a stern word from Jack on the need to be a support for Dot was enough to retrieve Hugh from High Doh to somewhere at the lower end of the treble stave. For a light baritone, Jack thought that was definitely a safer range.

Collecting Dot's coat and an overnight bag that her typically organised assistant had ready packed, Phryne supported the girl out to the Hispano, and drove at uncharacteristically dignified pace to the hospital. Having reunited husband and wife and put them in Mac's capable hands, Jack and Phryne beat a hasty retreat.

Although still premature, at nearly eight months, the twins were small but safe and delivered without undue problems. Dot and Mac between them coped admirably (though Mac insisted afterwards that Dot had been the one doing all the work). Hugh … less so. While doing his best to put a brave face on the whole nightmare, he struggled to hide his panic and unashamedly wept when first Margaret (for Dot) and then Gideon (for Hugh) saw the light of day and bawled out their young lungs. Dot, engulfed in his ecstatic hug, had to speak to him quite sternly about letting her breathe, please (but couldn't hide the love in her eyes and the flush of her cheek when she spoke to her children's father).

Phryne and Jack, alerted by Mac that it was safe to return to the hospital, dutifully admired the two new arrivals, confirmed confidently that they were the spitting image of their parents, and slipped away again from the racket as soon as possible. If either one of them was striding out to make it to the exit more quickly, no-one was rude enough to mention it.

As they were approaching the front door of the hospital, Jack was called over by the receptionist.

"Inspector? I have a call for you." He strode over and picked up the handset.

"Jack Robinson. What? Where? Thanks for letting me know. On my way."

He took Phryne's arm and hustled her to his car.

"A body at the Regent Theatre. Dressed in evening clothes. Come on, Special Constable Fisher, we're off to Collins St!"


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

Abandoning the car by the stage door, they raced in to find a rather grey faced deputy manager waiting for them.

"Through here please, Inspector ... Miss ..." He led them through a couple of corridors to the body of the theatre, then up the centre aisle to the foyer.

"It's here ..." He gestured, then seeing their expressions, followed his own arm with his eyes.

"Oh. That's ... odd."

As far as Jack and Phryne were concerned, he was gesturing to an artwork.

In what appeared to be tailor's chalk.

On the carpet.

In what would otherwise have been the work of Jack's team _before_ they removed the body.

Phryne paused, and glanced round, then ventured,

"Something smells fishy, Jack,"

Jack looked at her, unusually exasperated – it wasn't often that his favourite lady detective wasted time and breath stating the blindingly obvious. She returned his gaze solemnly.

"I mean you need to smell the air. Fish."

She was right. But while they and the manager were wandering the foyer space, trying to trace the source, one of the glass doors was flung open and a flash bulb popped.

"A night at the theatre! Lovely!" sneered the journalist. As quick as his own flashbulb, Phryne grasped his wrist.

"Travis, a moment, please."

"Oh, hang on, Miss Fisher, all's fair in love and war, I need to get my picture developed for the morning edition," he said nervously.

"Indeed you do," she agreed smoothly. "And you can do so," Jack ground his teeth – any more such pictures would be heading to the print press only over another dead body and this time it would be his, "just as soon as you explain to us the remarkable coincidence that the last three times the Detective Inspector and I have been in public, you have been there with your camera? And furthermore," she was now warming to her subject, and Travis was finding himself painfully drawn into the centre of the foyer, "on two of those occasions, at a crime scene?"

"Only two, Miss Fisher?" the journo sneered. "You don't think it's a crime to be scarfing down champagne while murderers are running around killing innocent citizens?"

Jack decided it was time he got involved.

"Are you saying you know the precise time of death of either of the two murders we've been called to in the last few days, Travis?"

The journalist realised his mistake a fraction too late, but battled on valiantly.

"You can't expect me to reveal my sources, Inspector. That's my lifeblood as a journalist, that is. You can't have a free press without it."

Jack's smile of amusement at this sally failed to reach his eyes. "The only lifeblood I'm concerned with right now, Travis, is that of the two people whose own lifeblood ceased to fulfil its purpose when their hearts ceased to function and Miss Fisher is absolutely right – your presence in both cases is such a coincidence as warrants a longer chat. At the station."

At this, Travis started to gabble frantically.

"Here, hang on, you can't arrest me!"

"Did anyone say I was?" asked Jack coolly. "It's a wicked lie, Travis – though I know you wouldn't recognise those, never having printed one in your life. You're going to help us with our enquiry into the deaths of two Melbourne citizens, in an interview room, at the station." He twitched the camera out of Travis' hands.

"And _this_ is evidence of the crime scene. Many thanks for your generosity in donating its contents to us, they will be returned to you as soon as we've solved the crime."

Phryne's expression was one of glittering satisfaction; Jack was awfully good at Masterful, she decided, happily. She piped up with her own contribution.

"I'll follow you there, if I may, Inspector – there's something here I want to check before I leave."

He inclined his head, and with an iron grip, escorted Travis to the police car.

Phryne turned to the manager.

"Now, I know this is all starting to look like an _improbable fiction_ ," at the reference, she got his attention, "but do you think you could show me where your sets get delivered?"

He agreed willingly, and together they sought out the delivery bay at the back of the theatre, which was entirely empty.

Except for a van, marked "Jones and Sons, Fishmongers".

Phryne allowed herself a smug smile, especially when she had a glance in the back; donning her gloves carefully, she hopped nimbly into the driver's seat and undertook a somewhat unorthodox delivery to City South Police Station.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

When she arrived, the interview room was occupied, and clearly the centre of a heated discussion. Apparently oblivious, she smiled at the duty sergeant.

"Hello – is it Sergeant White? I thought so. Super to meet you. Could I possibly ask a couple of favours?" Sergeant White looked a little concerned, but he knew enough of Miss Fisher to assume that she probably wasn't Wasting Police Time.

"Please could you place a call to the morgue? And, depending on what they say, get one of their people over here?" She winked. Conspiratorially. And in that second, acquired just one more slave.

The call to the morgue did, indeed, bring one of their number – after a short hiatus for a records check – to City South. Phryne warned all those present not to touch the controls of the fish van any further.

Sergeant White, in the meantime, had stuck his head around the door of the interview room, where the Inspector and Travis were getting nowhere.

"Sir? I think there's some new information you might find helpful," said White calmly.

Jack felt a certain amount of relief in leaving the room.

When he heard what Phryne had to say, his fury became, if not reduced, at least more precisely channelled.

He returned to the interview room with Phryne in tow. She stood by the door while Jack took the floor.

"Travis."

The hack looked up.

"Did you by any chance know a digger who was known as Stonewall?"

Travis paled.

"No. Never knew him." He collected himself. "Well, not personally."

He looked up at Jack.

"C'mon, Inspector, everyone knows there's one rule for the nobs and another for the rest of us."

"He was headed for the crematorium," Travis continued belligerently, "and still no-one knew who he was – I got it from my mate, he's one of the mortuary staff. That was what made me angry. The bloke clearly hadn't died of natural causes, but he was going to just get ignored, because he wasn't anyone special. "

"We investigate every death that gets reported to us," Jack said quietly. Phryne noticed that, while he could sometimes speak low, he would not normally stop at this stage between muttered confidence and whisper. She could only pity Travis' inability to recognise the minefield he had strayed upon.

"Yes, but you're not going to bust a gut over this one, are you? Pigs might fly, Inspector, you know that as well as I do. Because he was just another homeless digger. No matter that he might've stood up for his country. No matter that he got the wrong side of someone with a knife. As far as society was concerned, he was worthless. So I found a dress suit that would fit him, and kitted him out, and left him out again a couple of times. Like magic, Melbourne's finest are on the spot. What does that tell you, Inspector?" Travis was all bravado. And like a balloon, was punctured.

"It tells me I still have a murderer to find," Jack snapped. Then leaned back in his chair, and considered the journalist slowly. "It also tells me that you need to check the sky far more often, because you're going to be astonished to discover pigs with wings up there. I'd hate for one of those pigs to bring an early end to your _illustrious_ career."

"So," he said, in a voice which sent chills down Phryne's spine. She'd never, she thought, seen him so truly furious.

"Let me get this precisely straight. Because you – for whatever reason that has occurred to your sad, twisted mind – think that the police force would not expend the same effort on a crime committed against a poor person as a rich one, you have appropriated the body of a dead person – a complete stranger to you – from the morgue. To make a political point, you have dressed that person up in a costume and carted them about Melbourne in a fish van. You have had me and my officers spending hours investigating a crime which has only occurred _in your imagination_ , instead of performing the task of protecting the citizens of this city from criminals – of which, I would remind you, you are now one, on grounds of wasting police time and misappropriating evidence, and that's before I've even got started."

Jack was in his stride now. No weapons required but his conscience, his integrity and his anger. A devastating combination.

"You're going to have to remind me, Travis – which of us is it that is laying claim to the moral high ground here?

"Before you go, I have one more thing to show you – a case file. I'm not going to show you its contents, because you've already demonstrated the quality of your moral judgement. I'm just going to show you its thickness, and the name on the front cover."

Jack picked up a file from the floor beside him and slapped it down in front of the hack, whose sneer had steadily faded, being replaced by a slightly sickly look. He glanced down at the file, which had a single word on the cover – "Stonewall". He reached for it automatically, but Jack snatched it from under his hand.

"Not in a million years, Travis. If you think I'm going to let you trawl through an autopsy report, forty three witness statements and seventeen separate case reports by members of my team, just to satisfy your _prurient_ curiosity, you've got another think coming."

He rose to his feet, and Phryne, from her position by the door, admitted to being a little scared herself.

"Get out. Get out of my station, and be thankful you're not being charged. I will be sending a report to your editor, though, rest assured." His smiled, and Travis decided he preferred the frown. "After all, I wouldn't want you thinking we were in dereliction of our duty as citizens to report a crime to the appropriate authorities."

Jack's eyes were almost black, and didn't waver from Travis' gaze for an instant as the hack backed away, stumbling over the chair in his haste to escape from the interview room.

Phryne closed the door quietly behind him, picked up the chair and sat on it. If her legs were a little woolly, she couldn't imagine what state Travis' were in.

Jack collapsed in his own chair, and stared into space for a moment, before looking up to meet her gaze.

"Bravo, Jack," she whispered. Her voice shook just a little.


	12. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

The graveyard was almost deserted – a handful of mourners stood by the grave, and listened as the cleric recited the familiar words.

" … we commend to Almighty God our brother Stonewall, and we commit his body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust."

After the service was over, they drifted away until only Jack and Phryne were left, looking at the simple coffin.

"It's not much, Jack, but at least it's something," Phryne took his arm and squeezed it companionably.

Jack stood, sombre, hands in pockets, eyes cast down.

"Would we have done this if Travis hadn't kicked off his stupid charade?" he asked, knowing the answer full well.

"No. But if Travis hadn't kicked off his stupid charade, as you rightly call it, the extra dignity wouldn't have been called for." She moved to stand in front of him, forcing him to look her in the eye.

"You don't have anything to prove to anyone, Jack. You know yourself that you work as hard for every victim of crime in this city, no matter what their fortune. You might still find the person who killed Stonewall; but even if you don't, you'll have done your level best to try."

Reaching up, she planted the softest of kisses on the corner of his mouth.

She tugged his arm, leading him away from the graveside.

"Come on. I want to have a whisky by the fireside, and play draughts, and talk nonsense."

She smiled up at him, with that light in her eyes that always made his heart beat an uneven rhythm.

"And then, Detective Inspector, I'm going to take you to bed."

With that hint of warmth returning to his eyes, she saw her work was on the way to being done. Linking her arm with his, she tucked her head into that comfortable spot in his shoulder and led him to the car.


End file.
